Whatever Happened to the C86 Kids?
Whatever Happened to the C86 Kids?

Author: Nige Tassell

Publisher: Nine Eight Books

Published: 2022-08-18

Total Pages: 355

ISBN-13: 1788705599

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'You will love this book.' - RICHARD OSMAN Shortlisted for the Penderyn Music Book Prize A Rough Trade Book of the Year A Resident Book of the Year A Monorail Book of the Year A Virgin Radio Book of the Year In 1986, the NME released a cassette that would shape music for years to come. A collection of twenty-two independently signed guitar-based bands, C86 was the sound and ethos that defined a generation. It was also arguably the point at which 'indie' was born. But what happened next to all those musical dreamers? Some of the bands, like Primal Scream, went on to achieve global stardom; others, such as Half Man Half Biscuit and The Wedding Present, cultivated lifelong fanbases that still sustain their careers today. Then there were the rest - the ones who endured general indifference from the record-buying public and ultimately returned to civvy street. Now, thirty-five years on, journalist Nige Tassell tracks down the class of C86, unearthing members of all twenty-two bands and sharing the stories, both tragic and uplifting, of these long-lost musicians. Told with warmth, compassion and humour, this is a very human account of ambition, hope, varying degrees of talent and what happens after you give up on music - or, more accurately, after music gives up on you. It's a world populated by bike-shop owners, dance-music producers, record-store proprietors, ornithologists, driving instructors, solicitors, caricaturists and possibly even an Olympic sailor. And let's not forget the musician-turned-actor gainfully employed as Jeremy Irons' body double... More than simply the tale of the tape, Whatever Happened to the C86 Kids? is an exploration of C86's wide-reaching and often surprising legacy.

Field of Dreams
Field of Dreams

Author: Nige Tassell

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2023-03-30

Total Pages: 291

ISBN-13: 1398518557

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100 years of Wembley Stadium told through 100 matches. The 1923 FA Cup final – also known as the White Horse final – was the first football match played at the British Empire Exhibition Stadium. Although best remembered for its vast, well-beyond-capacity crowd, which had to be marshalled by a policeman atop a white horse, that afternoon marked the opening chapter of the long and eventful history of the stadium soon to be known simply as Wembley. Over the 100 years since that overcrowded day, Wembley has established itself as the home of the beautiful game and, almost certainly, the world’s most famous football stadium. It occupies a special place in the hearts of players and punters alike. Watching your team at Wembley is the highlight of a fan’s lifetime of support; playing there the fulfilment of a childhood dream. Its sacred pitch has been the crucible of many classic matches across the decades: World Cups have been won here, as have FA Cups, European Cups, play-off finals and more. And that hallowed turf has also seen greyhounds, stunt motorcycles, American football, plus the feet of 72,000 music fans at Live Aid in 1985. Nige Tassell chooses 100 matches - from the well known to the esoteric - that have shaped Wembley's legacy and tells a lively and original alternative history of the past 100 years of football, and of Britain. We hear a ball boy’s perspective on the FA Cup Final when Bert Trautmann broke his neck, about the other commentator of the 1966 World Cup final, and why a cup-winning team of eleven unemployed men didn't receive a trophy from a future king. Field of Dreams is the story of how football found its home.

How Soon is Now?
How Soon is Now?

Author: Richard King

Publisher: Faber & Faber

Published: 2012-04-03

Total Pages: 451

ISBN-13: 0571278329

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One of the most tangible aftershocks of Punk was its urgency to prompt individuals into action. Document your reality: do it yourself. From this, a generation of young men were inspired and, with often zero financial planning or business sense, in a bedroom, garage or shed, labels such as Factory, Rough Trade, Mute, 4AD, Beggars Banquet, Warp, Domino and Creation began, shifting the musical landscape and trading on an ethos and identity no brand consultant would now dare dream of. Musicians were encouraged to do whatever the hell they wanted and damn the consequences. From humble beginnings, some of our most influential artists were allowed to thrive: New Order, The Smiths, Depeche Mode, Orange Juice, Cocteau Twins, Sonic Youth, Happy Mondays, Primal Scream, Aphex Twin, Teenage Fanclub, My Bloody Valentine, Autechre, Broadcast, Vampire Weekend, The White Stripes and Artic Monkeys to name but a handful. This is the story, set to an incredible soundtrack, of the enormous scale of the passions, the size of the egos, and the true extent of the madness of the mavericks who had the vision and bloody-mindedness to make the musical landscape exciting again.

The Bottom Corner
The Bottom Corner

Author: Nige Tassell

Publisher: Random House

Published: 2016-09-01

Total Pages: 261

ISBN-13: 1473546184

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In these days of oligarch owners, superstar managers and players on sky-high wages, the tide is turning towards the lower reaches of the pyramid as fans search for football with a soul. Plucky underdogs or perennial underachievers, your local non-league team offers hope, drama or at least a Saturday afternoon ritual that's been going for decades. Nige Tassell spends a season in the non-league world. He meets the raffle-ticket seller who wants her ashes scattered in the centre-circle. The envelope salesman who discovered a future England international. The ex-pros still playing with undiluted passion on Sunday mornings. He spends time at clubs looking for promotion to the Football League, clubs just aiming to get eleven players on a pitch every week, and everything in between. One thing unites them: they all inhabit the heartland of the beautiful game. 'The Bottom Corner is a wonderful journey through life in the lower reaches of the football pyramid. A fascinating tale of a very different world of football from that of the overpaid stars of the television age' Barry Davies

Three Weeks, Eight Seconds
Three Weeks, Eight Seconds

Author: Nige Tassell

Publisher: Simon and Schuster

Published: 2019-04-02

Total Pages: 293

ISBN-13: 1643131079

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“I was convinced deep inside that I could not lose. I could not see how it could happen.” —Laurent Fignon “I didn't think. I just rode.” —Greg LeMondFor a race as long as the mighty Tour (three weeks of testing the limits of human endurance), to have the ultimate victory decided by a margin of just eight seconds almost boggles the mind. But that’s exactly what happened between American legend Greg LeMond and Laurent Fignon. And LeMond did it on the final stage, as the two sprinted through down the Champs Elysees. It remains the smallest margin of victory in the Tour's 100+ year history. But as dramatic as that Sunday afternoon was, the race wasn't just about that one time-trial. The leader's yellow jersey had swapped back and forth between LeMond and Fignon in a titanic struggle for supremacy, a battle with more twists and turns than an Alpine mountain pass. At no point during the entire three weeks were the pair separated by more than 53 seconds, a razor thin margin between ultimate triumph or agonizing torment. And all this despite LeMond's body still carrying more than 30 shotgun pellets after a shooting accident. Three Weeks, Eight Seconds brings one of cycling's most astonishing stories to life, examining that extraordinary race in all its multifaceted glory.

Rip It Up and Start Again
Rip It Up and Start Again

Author: Simon Reynolds

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2006-02-17

Total Pages: 433

ISBN-13: 1101201053

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A landmark history of post-punk, the basis of the documentary film directed by Nikolaos Katranis Renowned music journalist Simon Reynolds celebrates the futurist spirit of such bands as Joy Division, Gang of Four, Talking Heads, and Devo, which resulted in endless innovations in music, lyrics, performance, and style and continued into the early eighties with the video-savvy synth-pop of groups such as Human League, Depeche Mode, and Soft Cell, whose success coincided with the rise of MTV. Full of insight and anecdotes and populated by charismatic characters, Rip It Up and Start Again re-creates the idealism, urgency, and excitement of one of the most important and challenging periods in the history of popular music.

Lightning Striking
Lightning Striking

Author: Lenny Kaye

Publisher: HarperCollins

Published: 2022-01-11

Total Pages: 512

ISBN-13: 0062449222

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“We have performed side-by-side on the global stage through half a century…. In Lightning Striking, Lenny Kaye has illuminated ten facets of the jewel called rock and roll from a uniquely personal and knowledgeable perspective.” –Patti Smith An insider’s take on the evolution and enduring legacy of the music that rocked the twentieth century Memphis 1954. New Orleans 1957. Philadelphia 1959. Liverpool 1962. San Francisco 1967. Detroit 1969. New York, 1975. London 1977. Los Angeles 1984 / Norway 1993. Seattle 1991. Rock and roll was birthed in basements and garages, radio stations and dance halls, in cities where unexpected gatherings of artists and audience changed and charged the way music is heard and celebrated, capturing lightning in a bottle. Musician and writer Lenny Kaye explores ten crossroads of time and place that define rock and roll, its unforgettable flashpoints, characters, and visionaries; how each generation came to be; how it was discovered by the world. Whether describing Elvis Presley’s Memphis, the Beatles’ Liverpool, Patti Smith’s New York, or Kurt Cobain’s Seattle, Lightning Striking reveals the communal energy that creates a scene, a guided tour inside style and performance, to see who’s on stage, along with the movers and shakers, the hustlers and hangers-on--and why everybody is listening. Grandly sweeping and minutely detailed, informed by Kaye’s acclaimed knowledge and experience as a working musician, Lightning Striking is an ear-opening insight into our shared musical and cultural history, a magic carpet ride of rock and roll’s most influential movements and moments.

Temperature's Rising
Temperature's Rising

Author: Mike McGonigal

Publisher: Verse Chorus Press

Published: 2013-05-07

Total Pages: 194

ISBN-13: 1891241567

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Temperature's Rising: Galaxie 500 offers both an oral history of a celebrated band and a lush tour of their personal archives. It weaves together interviews with the band members (Naomi Yang, Dean Wareham, Damon Krukowski) and their music scene peers and many collaborators, accompanied by a stunning array of rare and never-before-seen photographs, artwork and ephemera.

The Wedding Present: Sometimes These Words Just Don't Have to be Said
The Wedding Present: Sometimes These Words Just Don't Have to be Said

Author: Richard Houghton

Publisher: This Day In Music Books

Published: 2017-09-15

Total Pages: 757

ISBN-13: 1787591077

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This fanthology is the first ever authorised book about indie legends The Wedding Present. With an introduction and commentary from band founder and mainstay David Gedge, The Wedding Present: Sometimes These Words Don t Have To Be Said is a collection of over 400 fan memories interspersed with insights from collaborators from across the band s career. These include former band members Peter Solowka, Shaun Charman, Paul Dorrington, Terry De Castro, Simon Cleave, Graeme Ramsay and Patrick Alexander and the band s producers and engineers including Chris Allison, Steve Lyon, Steve Albini and Grammy Award-winning Andrew Scheps. From David Gedge s school days through to concerts in 2016, the book is packed with full colour images, including many from David s personal archive. It contains stories from a host of celebrity fans, including Gaz Coombes (Supergrass), Mark Burgess (The Chameleons), Martin Noble (British Sea Power), Emma Pollock (The Delgados), John Robb (The Membranes), William Potter (CUD), Rolo McGinty (The Woodentops), Ben Lambert (Carter USM), and bands who have performed at David s annual At The Edge Of The Sea festival.

Butch Wilkins and the Sundance Kid
Butch Wilkins and the Sundance Kid

Author: Nige Tassell

Publisher: Birlinn Ltd

Published: 2018-09-06

Total Pages: 258

ISBN-13: 1788850920

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Butch Wilkins and the Sundance Kid chronicles the author's decade-long obsession with televised sport during his teenage years in the 1980s. Charting similar waters to Nick Hornby's classic Fever Pitch, but with the hopeless devotion of a teenager faithfully following his team around the country replaced by the hopeless devotion of a teenager faithfully following sport (any sport) around the TV schedules. It is memoir intertwined with nostalgia, ruminations on the changing face of sport during this time, portraits of its heroes and villains, and reflections on teenagehood and impending adulthood. Sweet, wise and witty, Butch Wilkins and the Sundance Kid is a hymn to televised sport in the 1980s – as well as to the decade itself – combining humour, insight and poignancy to vividly depict the way sport can transcend the television screen to impact on wider life, hopes and ambitions.